Still Life
by rahleeyah
Summary: Set mid-s2. Unable to sleep, Lucien sits down one evening to draw. What he creates will have far-reaching consequences for himself, and for Jean.
1. Chapter 1

_Art as exorcism._

That's how the Army psychologist who worked with Lucien following his release from the camp explained it.

 _If there's something you want to get out of your head, put it on the page. I've seen the way you hold a pencil; you like to draw, don't you? Draw it, Lucien. Trap your nightmares on the page, and then you can rest._

Much as Lucien had resisted at the time, his insomnia had eventually become so severe that one night something deep inside his chest snapped. In the absence of charcoal and a decent canvas he had settled for a pencil and a few precious sheets of loose paper the psychologist snuck onto the ward. He'd spent hours hunched over on the floor, scattered images of horror and devastation flowing from his mind through his hand and out onto the page. When it was done he wept like a child, and slept for the first time in days.

It had been fifteen years since that terrible night, and in many ways, Lucien Blake was a different man. Against all his wishes he had returned to Ballarat, had moved into his father's home, taken over his father's practice, assumed his father's role as police surgeon, drove his father's car, had been cowed by his father's housekeeper. He wore a fresh, clean suit every day, had hot meals and clean water aplenty, was treated with respect everywhere he went - well, most everywhere. If that man he'd been - broken and bloody and scarred and quite literally starving to death, half mad from grief and too weak to stand for more than five minutes at a time - could see him now, Lucien was certain he wouldn't recognize himself. And he wasn't entirely sure that was a good thing.

Old memories lurked beneath his skin, thrumming through his mind late at night. Memories were like malaria, he'd found; they could be treated, and their symptoms would fade, but sometimes they would resurge with a vengeance, quite out of the blue. They never truly healed. Even here, in tranquil Ballarat, far away from his old life and the reminders that had assaulted him at every turn during his Army days, the memories lurked in the darkness, waiting. Always waiting. He dreaded sundown; during the daylight hours he could keep himself busy, with a case, with a patient, sparring with Jean or teasing Mattie, the house full of the laughter of women. When night fell, though, the house grew still, and the demons walked. He purged them as he had always done; whiskey, or the piano, or charcoal. Whatever it took. And they would recede, and he would rest, and wake ready to face a new day, though somewhere in the darkest corner of his heart he knew they would be back again.

So he drew, and he drank, and banged on the piano until Jean came to rescue him from himself, pouring him into bed with all the tenderness of a mother fretting over a wayward child. She never mentioned it in the mornings, never mentioned how she gently removed his shoes, covered him with a blanket, smoothed his hair and whispered to him that everything would be all right. She knew, somehow, that he would not welcome the discussion, and he was grateful for her silence and her solicitousness.

The drawings had begun to change, though he could not pinpoint the exact moment when he ceased tracing out images of maimed bodies and devastation, and focused instead upon his latest obsession. He hadn't even realized he was doing it until he discovered he'd filled an entire sketchbook with it.

On this particular night, his head still buzzing from his latest case with the police department and his whiskey bottle nearly empty, he stumbled into his room and shuffled through his trunk, pulling out his artist's paraphernalia and preparing himself to draw again, hoping it would coax him into sleep without need of waking Jean. His mother had been an artist, and while she had filled him full of love and wonder for beautiful things, she had not lived long enough to truly teach him. He had studied art at university, dabbling in a few courses he really didn't have time for between his medical studies, as a way to draw closer to her, to honor her memory, and in the process he had discovered quite an affinity for it. It was not his mother's lessons, then, that had taught him which type of charcoal was best, which paper, how to shade and bring life to an image, but he still felt closer to her because of their shared passion, and he treasured that connection, however tenuous.

He opened his sketchbook, flipping through his work in search of a blank page on which to purge himself that evening, but to his chagrin he reached the end of the book, and found it full. _How did that happen?_ He asked himself. _When?_

He thumbed through the pages a second time, trying to recall what had possessed him so, and as he did a common theme emerged. The last twenty or so pages were all the same image, in varying stages of completion and refinement. It was a woman, naked, glorious, faceless. He had not gone so far as to give the image context, to cast her upon a chaise or a bed or leaning against a wall; he had only succeeded in capturing the barest outline of her essence, but there could be no doubt that it was the same woman on every page.

 _I must have been drunk as a lord,_ he thought in bemusement, _to draw her so many times and not remember._

He sighed, shaking his head at his own folly. It had been quite some time since last he'd enjoyed the company of a naked woman, but somehow he didn't think _this_ woman was a recollection of a previous conquest. Not that it mattered, really; it wasn't a woman who had preoccupied him when he resolved himself to draw tonight, and he was sure that if she were that important to him, he'd revisit her some other time. He set the sketchbook aside and retrieved a fresh one, carrying it back to the kitchen.

The kitchen was often the best place for him to work; it was deserted, this late at night, and the table presented a clean, flat work surface, whereas the desk in the surgery was too cluttered with paperwork and office detritus to really be suitable. Lucien laid out his supplies, taking care not to leave any black marks upon the table; somehow he didn't think Jean would approve. With a trembling hand he smoothed the first fresh page in the new sketchbook, and lifted his charcoal, ready to work.

Nothing happened.

Usually when he set to work like this he was already roaring drunk, and the lowered inhibitions - coupled with a complete disregard for form and perfection - resulted in the images flowing straight out of him, almost without direction. Tonight he'd only had two glasses of whiskey - so far - and he found himself almost paralyzed with indecision. Keeping his right hand raised above the page he reached for the whiskey with his left, downing the last of it in one great gulp before settling the glass upon the table.

 _All right old son,_ he told himself firmly. _Get to it._

He waited, but still, his hand did not seem to want to move. Grumbling to himself about the foolishness of the undertaking he pressed the little black stick to the paper, and drew a curve. And then another. And then a few more lines, and before he knew it his hand was flying across the page. It was not the long dirt road that had haunted him throughout the day, was not the memory of stumbling along on bare feet, exhausted, his back bleeding from the lashes delivered by the whip-wielding Japanese officer who hurried along the steps of the Allied POWs marching toward the camp that would become their own personal hell. It was the woman.

Tall and slender and graceful as a dancer, she came to life beneath his fingertips. The outline of her first; long legs, smooth arms, neat waist and flared hips. And then came the details; he had to stop to refill his glass of whiskey before he set about that next step, a bit of fortification before he faced the longing of his own heart. Shading, to highlight the curve of her chin, the artful tumble of her hair, the swell of her breasts, the thatch of curls between her legs. A little definition around her stomach, a pinprick for her bellybutton, an inordinate amount of care to get the size and shape of her nipples just right. _I should have used paint,_ he thought as he set to work on her hands, defining each of her delicate fingers, a bit heavy on the tips to simulate the paint on her nails, which most certainly should have been red, he decided as he worked. He paused briefly, shuffling off to his room to retrieve the old sketchbook and bringing it back to the table. He flipped through the images he'd already drawn, compared them to the vision on the page before him, making adjustments as he went, seeking to refine her in every possible way.

Three long hours later the sun was beginning to rise, and Lucien's mystery woman was nearly complete. She was beautiful, he decided as he looked at her, not overdone or tawdry despite her nakedness and the care he had taken over each intimate piece of her. She simply was, standing, alone and stark against the pale white paper, not a challenge or a titillation but a piece of truth in his world of swirling doubt. He had labored so long at his task that the sight of her did not fill him with arousal but with fondness, with hope; she brought a smile to his lips, eased the pain in his heart. The memories had faded beneath her gentle touch.

But she still had no face. The basic shape of it was there, her jaw and her hairline and the curve of her cheek, but between those lines was only blank space. It seemed invasive, somehow, to give her one, lest she be confused for someone else, lest she be reduced to no more than salacious imitation. She was so much more than that to his mind; she was an angel, his saving grace.

"Lucien?" a quiet voice murmured from the doorway.

He slammed his sketchbook closed with a resounding _thud,_ breaking his charcoal and very nearly his finger in the process, his head swinging up to stare at Jean incredulously. She was blinking at him owlishly in the feeble light of dawn, wrapped up in her fluffy pink atrocity of a dressing gown, her hair and makeup somehow already in perfect order despite the fact that she had clearly only just risen from her bed.

"Have you been here all night?" There was no judgement in her voice, no recrimination, only genuine concern for his well being.

For his part Lucien found himself struck dumb by the sight of her. Perhaps if he'd been drunk, or if he had not spent the last three hours pouring over his mysterious woman, he might not have noticed it at all. Perhaps if the first pale light of dawn had not struck Jean just so, had not set her grey eyes to sparkling or drawn his attention to the shine of her hair, he would never have put it together. As it was, however, he was paralyzed in the moment, utterly shocked by the realization that the angel who had haunted his dreams for more nights than he could count was in fact Jean herself.

All the details were there; her delicate wrists, the slope of her neck, the enticing curve of her hip, the line of her jaw. He had been studying the form of his angel for hours, and had apparently been drunkenly ruminating on her for months, and now that Jean stood before him stripped of her usual bravado he was forced to admit the truth. She was beautiful, was Jean, and he longed for her.

Until that moment he had been trying, with all his might, to put aside the yearning that tugged at him each time she passed by; though she had been warm and kind to him following his return from China, though she had comforted him in the aftermath of Joy's death, he was keenly aware that whatever affection he might harbor for her was not - could not be - returned in kind. Jean was strong and determined and _good,_ far better than he could ever hope to be, and she would never stoop so low as to have a man like him. Somehow he could not imagine that she would welcome any sort of advance from him, and he did not dare risk the blissful harmony of his home by infringing upon her honor. Propriety demanded that he keep his distance, though he longed for her proximity. And somehow, it would seem, his desire for her had invaded his subconscious, and having been denied the opportunity to run his fingertips across her smooth skin he had been forced to turn to the page, tracing that outline of her, the barest imitation of her glory.

"Jean," he croaked out at last, as her brow furrowed and she slowly approached him, watching him warily, as if she were afraid that he might lash out at any moment like a wild beast.

"What are you doing, Lucien?" she asked him softly, coming to a stop beside him.

Terror struck him; he could not show what her what he had done, could not confess to having so invaded her privacy with his imaginings of her naked body. She would be mortified, he knew, and his hands trembled at the thought of her pain, her wrath. He stared at those trembling hands, his fingertips smudged black with charcoal from the time he'd spent so carefully recreating her beauty on the page. No words came to him, and he hardly dared breathe, so frightened of his own desires, of the potential for calamity that hung in the air. Perhaps if he had not been so exhausted, so befuddled by his own tempestuous heart, he could have charmed her, could have pulled some excuse out of thin air to appease her, but weariness and want stayed his tongue. No words came to him, and Jean, growing more visibly concerned by the moment, reached for his book.

"No!" he snapped, catching her by the wrist, spurred into action by the sight of her red-painted nails against the tanned leather of his sketchbook. "No," he repeated, trying to modulate his tone at the look of righteous indignation upon her face.

"What on earth has gotten into you, Lucien?" she asked, snatching her hand out of his grip. And though she was cross, though his heart was aching, the memory of her soft skin brushing against his own flooded him with heat, with longing.

"It's nothing, Jean," he said, reaching up to smooth a hand over his hair. That moment's lapse in vigilance cost him dearly, for Jean seized the opportunity to reach not for the new sketchbook, close to hand, but for the older one, the one much worn by time and use, the one that contained myriad drawings of her, rather than just the one image. Like a child with a forbidden sweet she held it close and spun away from him, and before he could stop her she had opened the book. He had half-risen in horror, thinking to take the book back from her by any means necessary, but he realized that the battle was lost, and sank back into his chair, hanging his head in defeat.

For several long moments Jean was painfully, perfectly silent. Of course she had not opened the book to the first page, had not confronted the images of his captivity spilled out in stark black and white. She had turned to the back of the book, and was now carefully, slowly leafing through its pages, her eyebrows incredulously rising higher and higher with each image she saw. Though it had taken Lucien long enough to discover the truth he did not hold out hope that Jean would not recognize herself among those pages. After all, she was more intimately acquainted with her own body than he was, and she remained the cleverest woman he'd ever known.

"Lucien," she said his name a dangerously low sort of voice, closing the book to stare at him in wild-eyed horror.

"Jean, I can explain," he began haltingly, rising from his chair, but she simply took a step back from him, closing the sketchbook and holding it tight to her chest.

"How _could_ you?" she asked, the sudden shrillness of her tone grating on his ears after the gentle words she'd bestowed on him earlier, a mark of her rising chagrin.

"I didn't...it's not…" his protests were feeble to his own ears, and faded out before he found the words to explain himself.

"You can't...Lucien, I... _please._ You have to stop this. Promise me you'll stop," she begged him. For the very first time, Jean Beazley was all but speechless, her cheeks flaming red and her eyes wide as saucers as she stared at him in disbelief from across the room.

Dimly Lucien recalled Jean's visceral reaction to the pornographic film Edward Tyneman had made, recalled the way she had gone so far as to wash the bedsheet they'd used for a screen. Jean was a good Catholic woman, a woman of principle, prudent and above reproach, and he knew that seeing the way he had imagined her upon the page, knowing how much time he must have dedicated to the thought of her naked body, would strike her as an unacceptable invasion. Though he had no notion of _how,_ he knew he had to make things right.

"I'm so sorry, Jean," he told her earnestly. "I never meant-"

"I don't see how you could do something like this unintentionally, Lucien," she cut him off sharply. Taking a deep breath she drew herself up to her full height, and carried on. "I'm keeping this, Lucien. What you do in your free time is your business but I would thank you to leave me out of it."

And with that she spun on her heel and fled, clutching his sketchbook as if it were a liferaft. Lucien had no choice but to let her go, shaking his head at his own foolishness. After a moment he roused himself, and poured the last of his whiskey into his empty glass, throwing it back in one go.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Apologies for the long delay, I've been terribly ill the last week or so. I'm still not 100% so I don't know when I'll update next, but there will be at least one more chapter of this.**

* * *

All through that long day Jean struggled to focus, her thoughts too occupied with the sketchbook she'd secreted away beneath her mattress to pay attention to the mundane details of running the doctor's house. Lucien himself was nowhere to be found; by the time she had gathered her courage enough to return to the kitchen she'd found him gone, his hat and coat missing from their pegs by the door. Mercifully he had no patients that day, but when he did not return for lunch, Jean began to worry. Much as she was cross with him, much as she was terribly confused and more than a little frightened by what she'd discovered in the dim light of dawn, she could not help but be concerned for his well-being. Jean had grown accustomed to looking after Lucien Blake, making sure he was where he was meant to be, doing his laundry and keeping him fed, tending to all his hurts, in his body and in his soul. Caring for him had become second nature, and if what she felt when she looked at him was more than the sort of wry affection one might expect a housekeeper to have for a charming but decidedly difficult employer, she tried her best not to dwell upon it. Jean was a widow employed in service, and she knew her place. She knew what was expected of her, knew how to walk the path that had been laid before her feet, even if Lucien refused to learn the steps of his own dance. Nevermind that he was handsome, nevermind that the brush of his hand against the small of her back set her heart to racing, nevermind that every night while Lucien was away in China Jean had knelt beside her bed and whispered a rosary for him. No matter what her fickle heart might long for, Jean knew it could never be.

And now this. The expression of abject terror on his face when he saw her, his stammering attempt at apology, the heat of his fingers encircling her wrist, the terrible obscenity of the images he'd drawn, all set her thoughts to swirling into patterns she could not fathom. And Lucien had fled, had not lingered long enough for Jean to face him with a cool head, for her to ask him what on earth he had been thinking, though in truth she felt she already knew the answer to that question, much as she feared it. The longer he stayed away the more her doubts began to fester; why had he done it? What were his intentions? What did he think of her? And where on earth had he gone?

Some answers arrived late in the afternoon in the form of Charlie Davis, who stopped by on his way home from work to inform Jean that Lucien had been making a nuisance of himself at the police station all day, and that he had taken himself off to the club for supper. That at least resolved one of her immediate concerns; so long as she knew where he was, she could stop fretting about his safety and move on to more pressing worries. Cec Drury would keep Lucien in line, Jean knew, and if there was trouble afoot he knew to ring her on the doctor's telephone. If Lucien worked himself into a state tonight it would not mark the first time Jean had been forced to collect him from the club, and she suspected it would not be the last.

Dinner was a quiet, stilted affair; though Mattie had noted Lucien's absence and asked after him Jean's somewhat tart response had been enough to put an end to that line of questioning, and as always Mattie respected her rather obvious need for peace and quiet. They ate quickly and without discussion, and then Mattie took herself off to her room, leaving Jean to her dishes and her doubts. The house was too quiet and the work over too quickly; as she dried the last dish and tucked it away in the cupboard Jean found herself at a loose end. There was no more work to be done, and the thought of settling down on the sofa with her knitting and the wireless held no appeal; Jean did not want to wait up for Lucien tonight, did not want to face him coming home drunk and stinking, did not want to address the issue of what she'd discovered in his sketchbook. It was too much for her to bear, and so she squared her shoulders and marched herself straight up the stairs and into her room.

There was no reprieve to be found there, however, for as soon as she entered her room her eyes darted straight to the mattress. Though she could not see the book she could almost feel its presence, almost hear it calling out to her in some ghostly siren's song. Jean had not taken the time to really look at the images in the book, had only glanced at them, flicking through the pages with fear rising like bile in the back of her throat. Did she really want to see them, to know for a certainty what Lucien thought of her, what he saw when he looked at her, the way he had so reduced her from an independent woman of her own making to no more than a vixen upon a page? For all that she had tried not to stare too long at those pictures she had seen enough to convince herself that Lucien had been drawing her, and the thought of it was enough to turn her stomach.

 _Perhaps I was wrong,_ she thought glumly, crossing her arms over her chest and leaning back against the door. Beyond her window the sun was sinking, painting her room in shades of gold, but Jean herself was too electrified to settle down, her skin tingling and her eyes unable to look away from her bed and the book she'd hidden there. _Perhaps that's why he was so distraught, because I misunderstood._

It would be better to know for sure, she told herself.

Thus resolved she crossed the room at once and fetched the book out from underneath the mattress. She sat primly in the center of her bed, tucking her legs up underneath her and smoothing her fingers over the worn cover of the book. The leather was soft and supple beneath her fingertips, the pages turning easily, loosened by time and use. As Jean began to carefully leaf through the pages her heart seemed to freeze in her chest; the earlier drawings were not of her, were not renderings of naked women splashed in horrible obscenity against the rough parchment pages. No, these drawings were images of horror, devastation. Bodies maimed and mangled, long roads lined with pain, a man kneeling with his hands bound to a post while a faceless stranger lifted a whip over his back, a child wailing next to its lifeless mother. Tears sprang to Jean's eyes as she realized what she was seeing, as she saw the care Lucien had taken to transfer these memories of war and grief from his mind to the page. They were terribly lifelike, and the lines and curves of each image burned themselves into her mind.

 _No wonder he cries out in the night,_ Jean thought in abject sorrow as image after image flashed before her eyes. Such terrible things would be enough to break any man, and Lucien's heart was bigger than most.

It was almost a mercy when the drawings changed, when she turned a page and found not a headless body or a heartbroken child but instead the familiar curves of her own body. The first drawing was rough, only the faintest outline of a woman, and though there were no signs to indicate who this woman was Jean felt it in her bones, could almost see her own face carved into the blank space he'd reserved in this image. She was turning the pages more slowly now, watching as with each passing attempt Lucien's woman came more clearly into focus. Though her heart was racing, though her hands were trembling, she forced herself to carry on until she reached the final image in the book.

For a long time Jean simply stared at it, breathing shallowly, cheeks flaming. She was no great student of art, had been forced to leave school early to help out on her family's farm and spent most of her life working much too hard to go lazing about the local museums. The icons of the saints and the stained glass windows of her church contained almost the full sum of her knowledge of art, and even then she did not possess the words, the vocabulary so specific to artists that she felt was necessary to convey what she felt when she looked upon such stark, unquestionable beauty. Though she was as comfortable with her own body as any woman who'd lived past forty and borne two children could be, she had not been much exposed to the naked female form; even that painting Lucien had brought home had been vague in its own way, had lacked the sheer staggering reality of the drawing beneath her fingertips. And so, shocking as it was, Jean found she could not tear her eyes away from the image, found herself so overcome with curiosity and self-consciousness and a terrible, churning longing that she could hardly blink.

 _Is this how he sees me, truly?_ She asked herself as with the edge of one red-painted nail she traced the line of the woman on the page, the slope of her calf, the curve of her hip, the dip of her waist, the swell of a breast, the rise of her shoulder. This woman was familiar, faceless as she was; the tapering of her fingers, the curl of her hair, everything about her seemed to whisper Jean's name. _Surely,_ she thought, ashamed even as the idea occurred to her, _if he were drawing someone else, some desire of his, he would have drawn her breasts larger, would have made her perfect._ For though the image was beautiful, it seemed to Jean that in it she saw every imperfection she had always lamented in her own self. Oh, Jean knew she was attractive enough, for a widow with grown children, but she had, as most women will, measured herself against the actresses in her favorite films and the singers from her favorite records and the wealthier wives at Sacred Heart and found herself lacking in certain departments.

Lucien didn't seem to mind, if the care with which he'd drawn her was any indication of his feelings on the subject. It must have taken him ages, she knew, to get all the details just right; he must have sat at that table where they took their meals night after night, pouring over her, the tips of his fingers turned black as he used them to shade and smooth the lines of her. _But why?_ She asked herself. What good would it do him, to dedicate himself so to drawing her, when he saw her every day?

Perhaps, she told herself, the answer lay within the other images in the book. The nightmares that tormented him, the memories that kept him from sleeping, he had purged them each upon the page. Did he feel the same about her? She wondered. Was the sight of her, the very idea of her naked body beneath her clothes enough to disturb him, to send him fleeing from his bed in search of some reprieve, some sanctuary? Did he _want_ …

Jean's heart began to pound. For months now she had been trying, with all her might, to put aside her own want, her own desire, her own selfish need, trying to ignore the clamoring of her heart in her chest, trying to avert her eyes from the strain of his bicep against his shirt sleeve, from the twinkle of his blue eyes, from the curve of his bum beneath his trousers. For months now Jean had fallen asleep to the imagined caress of his hand, had woken sweating and shaken and shamed by dreams of him moving over her, around her, _in_ her. Even now, sitting on her bed alone in the still of the evening her stomach clenched and a rush of heat washed over her at the thought. Could it be, she asked herself, that Lucien felt the same dire longing, that these drawings were his way of reconciling himself to what he thought he could never have?

It was almost more than she could bear, almost enough to send her rushing from her bed to the Colonist's Club in an instant. _Almost_ , and yet not quite enough, for still her doubts lingered. Jean knew her own heart, knew she cared for him, body and soul, wholly and completely, in a way that was most inappropriate and yet utterly unstoppable. If those affections were returned in kind she knew she would rejoice, would be overcome and overjoyed, and yet the pages before her were not enough to reassure her of his intentions. Perhaps he simply thought her attractive; he would hardly be the first to be interested in her body and completely unconcerned with her heart. Such a one-sided sort of affair would be enough to break her completely, she knew; the depth of her regard for him would not survive a bout of simple lust. What she needed then was proof, not just of his desire but of his love, his affection, his longing. But then, she asked herself, how could she go about getting it?


	3. Chapter 3

A full week passed before Lucien found himself alone in a room with Jean again. In the interim he had spent more time than he was accustomed to at the station or the club, and when he did find himself at home in the daylight hours he used Mattie or his patients as a buffer between himself and his lovely housekeeper. He had tried to offer his apologies the night she'd found him in the kitchen, but the horror and displeasure on her face haunted him, and now the words would not come, to offer her any further explanation. How to explain that he had drawn her, not simply because she was lovely, but because she soothed him, because just the sight of her brought him peace? How could he explain that the pounding in his heart when he found himself in her proximity was more than lust or simple desire, but was instead the result of a need so strong and all-consuming that he could hardly think for wanting her? Wanting, not just the enticing curves of her body but the softness of her voice, the gentleness of her touch, the comfort of knowing that she felt the same irresistible pull towards him that drew his steps ever closer to her? Such a confession would shock her, he knew, and so he held his tongue and kept his distance for as long as he could.

They shared the same house, however, and Lucien knew he could not avoid her forever. His luck ran out one Saturday evening, when Mattie had gone out with friends and left Lucien to rattle around in his study, warring with himself as he tried to decide how best to approach Jean. Something would have to be done, he knew. The silence could not continue indefinitely. He would have to find some way to speak to her, to regain the comfort and companionship they had enjoyed until that moment she stumbled across his drawings.

 _All right, old son,_ he told himself sternly. _There's nothing else for it. Go._

Reluctantly he dragged himself out of his chair, squared his shoulders, and made his way to the kitchen, following the soft sound of Jean's humming, accompanied by the clang and clatter of pots and pans. When her reached the doorway he stopped for a moment, watching her, left breathless in an instant by the sight of her.

There was nothing particularly remarkable about her outfit, her tight brown skirt, her pale pink blouse, the flowered apron tied around her waist. He had seen those clothes on her before, had studied the artful tumble of her dark curls, the smooth curve of her bum, on more occasions than he cared to count. There was something so...familiar about her loveliness, as warm and enveloping as returning home at the end of a long journey to the embrace of a loved one and a hot cup of tea. She was everything to him, and as he watched her work, watched her long legs flexing as she went up on her toes to place a teacup in the cabinet, watching the smooth line of her arm as she lifted a heavy dish, he swallowed against a sudden lump in his throat, overwhelmed with the desire to go to her, to tell her just how he felt about her. Still, though, he knew that he needed to tread carefully with her, and so he only cleared his throat, announcing his presence before she caught him lurking in the doorway, watching her with hungry eyes.

Jean spun on her heel, but though her grey eyes flashed when she caught sight of him she did not admonish him, did not chide him for sneaking up on her, did not launch into any sort of diatribe. She only smiled, softly, uncertainly, and reached for the kettle.

"Cup of tea?" she asked.

He could think of no better way to begin what might soon prove to be a terribly uncomfortable conversation, and so he returned her wavering smile, and nodded. "That would be lovely, Jean, thank you," he said, and then, because he did not know what else to do, he took a seat at the table while Jean set about fixing their tea.

As he sat he stared at his hands, clasped together in his lap. Lucien keenly felt the need to address what had come before, the book and her response and everything that went with it, but he weighed his words carefully. She had offered him an olive branch, and he did not want to throw it back in her face.

"Jean," he said slowly, finally. "About the book-"

"Here's your tea," Jean interrupted him breathlessly, placing the cup in front of him and twirling away again before he could stop her. Perhaps, he thought morosely as he reached for his cup, she did not want to discuss it at all, and he ought to just be grateful that she hadn't stormed out of the house. He cast about for another topic of conversation then, another way to engage her, to discover what the state of relations between them would be, but she beat him to the punch, his clever Jean. She was standing against the counter on the far side of the room, cradling a steaming cup of tea in both hands.

"You know, Lucien," she began softly, hesitatingly, "you have quite a talent. Your drawings are...quite good."

For a moment Lucien simply stared at her, dumbfounded. Though her eyes were sparkling she wasn't quite smiling, and he knew she wasn't quite as confident as her words made her seem. It must have been difficult, he knew, for her to find the courage to broach the subject, to confess to having looked through his book, to having seen all the drawings therein, all the many images of her own naked body scrawled across the pages. And yet she was not cross, did not seem angry or disappointed. In the moment, it rather felt as if she wanted something from him, but he could not fathom what that might be.

"Thank you," he said slowly. "I'm glad you liked them."

Her smile was there and gone in a flash, but still, it warmed him through and through.

"I can't say I approve of the content, of course," she continued, lifting her chin as if daring him to correct her. It was a challenge he did not accept; Lucien ducked his head, shamed to think how those drawings must have changed her opinion of him. "But do you know, Lucien," she told him in a gentle tone of voice, "I don't think anyone's ever drawn a picture of me. And I haven't had a photograph taken since the boys were young."

Lucien raised his head slowly to stare at her in disbelief. It wasn't so much the words she said that surprised him; he imagined that a woman like Jean, practical and no-nonsense, a woman who had neither free time nor money to spare, would indeed have had very few opportunities to have her photo taken. No, what surprised him was the glint in her eyes.

"If you wanted to...that is, if ever you felt the need to...draw again, Lucien, please, just ask me. I think I might like-"

"Jean," it was his turn to interrupt her, rising from his chair at once. His hands were shaking, but he felt he had just been handed a rare opportunity, and he was determined to reach out and grasp it, not to lose the chance for redemption. "I feel as if I've taken advantage of you and I would like, very much, to make it up to you. If you wouldn't mind, I would like to draw something for you, something you can keep."

Jean's cheeks flushed pink but she smiled at him, a soft, tremulous smile that boosted his spirits enormously. She wasn't turning him away, wasn't telling him no, and he was grateful for it.

"A picture of me?" she asked, and he nodded, his mouth suddenly too dry to speak. "With all my clothes on, I hope," she added dryly, making some attempt at her usual cheek, and Lucien fought the urge to groan as his mind was suddenly overwhelmed with visions of Jean stripping bare so that he could draw her as he had done in the past, only this time with a living model as a guide.

"I would like that Lucien, very much," she said decisively. Jean turned away, ostensibly to dispose of her teacup, and Lucien only just stopped himself from reaching out to her.

"Now?" he croaked, desperate to keep her close, not to lose the progress they'd made thus far.

Jean's hand went to her curls, fluffing them self-consciously as the color rose in her cheeks. "Oh, not now, Lucien. You don't want to draw me looking like this."

"I do," he answered earnestly. "Jean, I try to draw things as they are. As I see them. And this, the way you look right now...this is who you are. Please."

For a moment she stared at him, wringing her hands, doubt shining in every line of her face. Lucien stood very still, silently begging her to trust him, praying she would not turn him away, not now when they had come so far.

"All right," she said at last, and he had to fight down a sudden urge to cross the room, catch her face in his hands, and kiss her full on the lips.

"I'll just fetch my things," he told her, "and then we can get started."

With those words he left her, following the familiar path down the hall to his bedroom. He retrieved his supplies, his charcoal and his sketchbook, and as he did he noticed that his hands weren't trembling, any more. It seemed to Lucien that Jean had come around, that the sketchbook she had taken and the time that he had given her to think over what she'd discovered had not pushed her away from him, had if anything made her somewhat curious, and that thought cheered him immensely. He wanted her care, her interest, her concern, and the time it would take him to draw her, to capture the essence of that beautiful woman who had so enraptured him, would be to him a precious gift. Moments carved out of a busy life when Jean could finally be still, when he could gaze at her in all her glory, when they could sit together in the same room and speak softly to one another, protected by the pretense he'd established for them. He simply couldn't wait.

"The sunroom, I think," he announced as he entered the kitchen with his sketchbook tucked under one arm, reaching out with the other to guide Jean into the other room. She had removed her apron but remained otherwise unchanged, and he smiled to see it.

"Why?" she asked, raising a single perfect eyebrow at him, and he almost laughed. It was so very _Jean,_ he thought, to question everything, no matter how innocuous.

"It makes me think of you," he answered honestly. "Of every room in this house, that's the one that most reflects who you are, I think. And the flowers are quite pretty." Jean considered this for a moment, watching him with that fierce, clever gaze he loved so well, but finally she acquiesced, silently following his instruction and making her way to the sunroom.

The light was perfect, somehow. The sun was sinking slowly beyond the horizon, and everything in sight was golden and lush with growth, with change, with purpose. Lucien led Jean to the window, encouraging her to stand amidst the brightly colored blooms, the sun striking her face just so, making her glow. He settled himself upon the little sofa and dragged the table over, but immediately huffed in frustration; the table was too low, and he couldn't draw comfortably in that position. Jean began to laugh at him as he hitched up his trousers and shifted so that he was sitting upon the floor with his supplies spread out across the table, and the sound of it tinkled in his ears like some merry little bell.

"That's better," he said as he arranged everything to his liking. "And now we begin."

"What do I do, Lucien?" she asked uncertainly, wringing her hands together. It was the first time he could recall ever seeing Jean looking at all awkward, unsure of herself. Usually, Jean was a commanding figure, always so sure of her place, but now that she was not pressed into service, now that all he required of her was simply that she be herself, as she was, she did not seem to know what to do.

"Well," he said slowly, studying the line of her arm, the curve of her hip, trying to imagine a position she could hold comfortably, a position that would also translate well upon the page. "Why don't you rest your left hand on the table by that little red chap there, and then you can - yes that's perfect," he finished with a smile, watching as she propped her right hand against her hip and lifted her chin. Her posture was open, her back straight, the hand on her hip highlighting the sharp tuck of her waist, the flowers all around her beautiful and bright and yet still not as lovely as she. "Perfect," he repeated softly. He could happily have sat there upon the hard floor staring at her for the rest of the night, but the charcoal stick he clutched in his hand reminded him of his purpose, and so he set to it with a will.

* * *

It was harder than she thought it would be, standing still and allowing Lucien to look at her as much as he liked. The moment he began to draw her nose began to itch, as if somehow the need to remain perfectly still had translated into an immediate reflex to move. She scrunched up her face, trying to will her hands to remain in place despite the desire to scratch her nose becoming almost painful, but then Lucien looked up and laughed at her feeble attempts.

"You can move a bit, if you need to," he said, ducking his head. Jean surreptitiously rubbed her fingertips across her nose and then immediately returned to her previous position. He was silent as he worked, and each time his gaze returned to the page Jean allowed herself a moment to stare at him, to watch him as hungrily as he watched her. The line of his broad shoulders, the flexing of his muscles beneath his shirt, the furrow in his brow as he concentrated, the way his fingers, broad and thick and calloused, handled the charcoal so gently. He was a mess of contradictions, was Lucien Blake, and endlessly fascinating to her because of it. Jean was so grateful he'd suggested this, so grateful for the opportunity to watch him work, to mend their fractured connection, doubly grateful that he had spared her the indignity of having to ask for this outright. It had been her plan all along, of course, to engineer a way for her to watch him at work, to see how he looked at her, given the chance, to study him and determine for herself what it was he saw when he looked at her, what feeling it was she inspired in him. She had been in no way prepared for his gentle dedication, however, for the way he seemed to use his whole body when he applied himself to this task, the sheer intensity of his gaze as he watched her. Each time those blue eyes fell upon her she looked away, feeling the heat rising in her cheeks, cursing herself for not being strong enough to face him head on.

The sun continued its slow progress below the horizon, plunging them into shadows. Jean lamented the oncoming darkness, not wanting to leave this place, surrounded by the gentle scent of the flowers she loved so well, paralyzed by the heat of Lucien's attention. And as she watched him she came to realize that it was not lust that had led him to this place, that had urged him to speak to her so gently, to so reverently set about tracing her image upon the page. Or at least, she told herself, not only lust. There was want in his eyes, yes, a want she recognized all too well, but there was more than that here. He said he wanted to draw her as she was, in the sunroom, in a place that reminded him of her, and those simple words told her everything she needed to know. He knew her, saw her as she was, and he cared for her just the same. It was a heady thought.

When finally the shadows grew too long Lucien heaved himself up off the floor, but instructed her to stay right where she was. For several long minutes she stood alone by the window, listening to him rattling around the house, wondering what on earth he could be getting up to, until finally he came waltzing back into the sunroom with a smile on his face and an oil lamp in each hand.

"Pardon me," he said softly as he placed the lamps, one on either side of her, and carefully lit them. He was close, so close she could almost detect the scent of his cologne among the flowers, so close she could watch his Adam's apple bob above the open neck of his shirt as he swallowed, and her knees went weak at the thought. Once the lamps were lit he returned to his perch upon the floor, smiling up at her, the guileless, innocent smile of a schoolboy who had just been presented with his favorite sweet.

"Perfect," he said again.

Though Jean could not see what he was drawing, could not see how the vision of her came to life beneath his fingertips, she _could_ see the care with which he set about his task, the heat in his eyes, the way his hand ghosted across the page. By now it seemed he had finished with the outline of her and was setting about filling in the details; his fingertips were smudge black from shading and he caught his lower lip between his teeth, a little furrow forming between his brows as he concentrated. Jean's fingers itched to reach out, to smooth away that line of worry there. He worried about so much, so many things, all the time, constantly. She did not want to be another source of worry for him.

As she watched him it seemed to Jean that something in the air had shifted. The dancing light of the oil lamps threw the shadows on his face into sharp relief, the line of his beard, the darkness of his eyes. The heady scent of beauty and bloom that surrounded her, the lines of his face, the knowledge that all his attention, all his focus was on her, all of it shifted around inside her, swirling and building into a great roaring maelstrom of want. _This is how he looked,_ she thought, _when he was drawing me before. This is how he looks, when he is thinking only of me._ Handsome and consumed, he looked like one of the saints from the stained glass windows of Sacred Heart.

And suddenly, Jean found she did not want to fight her desire for him another moment longer. He had been kind to her, had been solicitous to her needs, had apologized for overstepping and immediately tried to set things to rights, and now he was bent to his task, enraptured as he tried to capture her essence upon the page. He was brave and strong and gentle, despite all he had been through, and Jean found in that moment that she did not want him to draw her like this, stern and commanding and wrapped in layer after layer of armor, protection from the world. She wanted him to see her as she was, all of her, to compare the truth of her to the imaginings he had scratched out upon the page. And she wanted, very much, for him to find the truth of her more alluring than any fantasy.

Perhaps it was the darkness that made her bold, or the knowledge that he had already devoted rather a lot of time to pondering her naked flesh. Perhaps it was the way the lamp light flickered on the hollow of his throat, along the thick column of his neck where she longed to plant her lips. Perhaps it was just her, wanting him, alone in a room without any pretense or demand to stop her from giving in to her own longings. Whatever the reason, for the first time in a very long time, Jean Beazley acted on impulse.

Lucien was engaged in his work, his eyes upon the page, and so he did not notice at first as she reached up with trembling hands and began to unfasten the buttons of her blouse.

* * *

Lucien worked carefully; he had filled in the outline of Jean and the flowers that surrounded her, and now he set to work carefully detailing the curl of her hair, the lines of her blouse, the shape of her face. For a time he remained focused on the page, not needing to look for the image of her was burned in his mind. Eventually, though, he needed another glance, a reminder of how the light struck her, where the shadows ought to go, and so he looked up, eager for another chance to gaze upon her.

As he did, however, the charcoal tumbled from his fingertips and the breath vanished from his lungs in an instant.

Jean, beautiful, glorious Jean, was in the very act of shrugging out of her blouse. Her cheeks reddened as she noticed his attention but she did not cease her movements. Carefully she reached behind her, tugged down the zip of her skirt, let it slide down her hips before kicking it to the side. Now she was clad only in her underthings, though that was enough, slip and knickers and bra and garter belt and stockings. Without a word she carried on, catching her slip in her hands and dragging it up over her head, and the sudden wealth of smooth skin revealed to him was so lovely that his heart very nearly stopped beating.

"Jean," he croaked out, mouth suddenly dry. At the sound of his voice she stopped, wringing her hands together as she stared at him. Jean was not smiling, but there was hope in her gaze, a hope so bright and full of joy that it warmed him through and through.

"I just thought," she said slowly, toeing out of her shoes to stand upon the ground in her stocking feet, "well, this is how you drew me. Before."

As she spoke he rose to his feet, drawn to her by some unfathomable force, desperate to feel the heat of her skin beneath his hands. It seemed to him that he must have fallen asleep, that he must be dreaming, for waking life was too cruel to grant him such a precious gift. Jean was more beautiful than he could ever have imagined; her skin was soft and smooth, and though the marks of time shone upon her she was still slender and graceful as a dancer, her neat breasts, the flare of her hips calling out to him in a voice he could not ignore.

Carefully he closed the space between them, and though Jean did not retreat, she likewise did not make a move to continue undressing, to bare herself to him in earnest; perhaps she had come as far as she dared, and would need some sign, some motivation from him before she could be encouraged to complete the task she'd set for herself.

"Jean," he breathed her name as he drew near, reaching out with the intent of ghosting his hand across one pale shoulder, though he drew back at once when he noted the dark black of the charcoal on his fingertips. It would not do, he told himself, to mar her perfect skin.

She tilted her chin, a question in her eyes, a question he knew he had to answer.

"You are so beautiful, Jean," he murmured softly, drawing nearer to her still, until they were almost touching. Keeping his hands away from her was killing him slowly; he needed her, the fire of her touch, needed to know the way she tasted and the sounds she made, needed the chance to take her in his arms and worship every inch of her, the way that she deserved, but still he held back, unsure of how they had come to this point, unwilling to give it up.

"More beautiful than your pictures?" she asked, her voice a breathy whisper. It was the sound of that voice that pushed him over the edge, that voice so low and warm and soft as honey.

"A thousand times more beautiful," he answered as he gave in, tangling his fingers in her dark curls even as she surged up towards him, her lips as hot and hungry as his own.

That first taste of her went through him like an electric shock, set his every nerve to tingling, lit a fire in his belly that only she could quench. Her nails scraped across the back of his neck as she drew him impossibly closer, the curves of her body pressed hard and fast to his own. She was warm and soft and perfect, and he could not get enough of her. With no thought to the marks he might leave upon her his hands scrabbled across her back, searching for the clasp of her bra, and the second he found it he had it unfastened, helped her slip her arms through the straps though they were neither of them willing to break their heated kiss, even for a moment, as their tongues slipped and slid together, desperate and insatiable. The moment she was bare his hands slipped between them, palming her breasts, kneading her gently, feeling her nipples pebbling beneath his touch while she whimpered against his lips. The sound of it drove him all but wild with longing for her, and the way her fingers threaded through his hair, tugging, demanding, asking for more, only encouraged him.

Without a second though Lucien reached down and caught her bum in his hands, lifted her until her legs locked tight around his waist even as her arms draped around his neck, holding on for dear life. He tore his mouth away from the sweetness of her lips, trailing kisses down her neck, eager for the sound of her soft lilting sighs to fill the stark sudden silence of the sunroom. He rocked her against him, cursing his trousers, all the layers that separated his rapidly growing hardness from her tender heat. Though he could not say what had changed in her, what she had seen in him this night that had made her so bold, so willing to let him hold her, he gave thanks for it, determined to take the opportunity he had been given and lavish all the love, the yearning he felt for her upon her, to banish the thought of any other man and make her his, wholly, truly, completely.

As his lips feathered down across the line of her collarbones, heading for the soft swell of her breast, he had to pull himself away, laughing. There upon her breast were the tell-tale marks of his charcoal covered fingers, soft black trails tracing across her skin. At the sound of his laughter Jean looked down, perturbed, but then she saw what had caused his sudden mirth, and she only smiled softly, threading her fingers through his hair.

"I'm sorry, love," he said, not feeling sorry in the least. Jean's breath caught in her throat at the sound of that word falling from his lips and the mood between them shifted suddenly, undeniably. Her grey eyes caught his, held him, searched him, and he let her, kept his gaze open, desperately hoping that she could see everything he felt for her when she looked upon him, that she could see he was not taking advantage of her sudden amorous mood, that he wanted her, and her alone, fiercely. And perhaps she could, for she did not speaking, simply used the hands cradling his head to draw him to her for another blinding kiss.

With Jean in his arms he stumbled across the room, carefully laying her down on the couch, watching the way her breasts swayed as she moved, the flush creeping over her chest, up the smooth column of her neck, the fluttering of the muscles in her stomach as he dragged his black-tipped fingers from her collarbones down over her chest to the jut of her hipbones. With a gentle touch he set about divesting her of the last of her clothes, carefully pulling the satin and lace from her body, sliding the stockings down her shapely legs, watching as she shifted, her eyes hooded and hungry as she helped him to complete his task.

And then she was bare, and the sight of her, the thatch of curls between her legs, the smooth line of her thigh, the glimpse he caught of her sex dark and glistening and begging for his touch, left him overcome and overwhelmed in a moment. There was nothing else for it then but for him to kneel between her thighs, his hands wrapping around them, leaving dark marks as his fingers curled around her flesh, guided her into a position that would suit them both. As she realized what he was about to do she gasped his name once, her voice throaty and full of yearning, and the sound of it was sufficient to spur him on.

Taking one deep breath he buried his face between her thighs, his tongue darting out at once to trace the line of her folds, seeking to drink her in, to consume her whole, to show her just how very much she meant to him. At the first pass of his tongue against her she moaned and tangled her hands in his hair, holding him close and canting her hips up towards him invitingly. It would not do, he knew, to sink his charcoal-covered fingers inside her and so he set about using only lips and tongue, gently sucking tender flesh between his teeth, laving her with his tongue, his nose brushing through her sparse curls.

The sounds that left her now only grew in intensity the longer he worked over her, and as her arousal grew so too did his desire to claim her utterly. His tongue thrust inside her, curling, not quite deep enough and yet more than sufficient to draw a cry of pleasure from her lips. He watched her over the rise of her belly, his eyes fastened to her face, intent on documenting the sight of Jean in the throes of passion. Her head was cast back against the arm of the sofa, her eyes closed, her hair a riot of unruly curls, his name a constant begging chant falling from her lips more beautiful than any song.

Lucien lingered there as long as he dared, teasing her, tasting her, pushing her higher and higher until finally he had mercy on her. His lips wrapped around the bundle of nerves at her center, laving her with his tongue, suckling lightly until she cried out, louder, and louder still, until her body went tense and then shuddered into bliss, soft and wet and perfect beneath his ministrations. He guided her through with lips gentle on her skin, lapping at her softly, feeling the fluttering of her sex beneath his questing tongue until at last she used the hands still buried in his hair to draw him to her. Her eyes were bright, full of joy, of love, and he could not stop himself.

"I love you, Jean," he told her softly, pressing wet kisses to the rise of her cheekbones.

She sucked in a sharp gasp, but did not contradict, only watched him with those eyes so wide and open and devastating as the sea in a storm. "Is that why you drew me, Lucien?" she asked him then, and he paused his gentle kisses, sensing the enormity of her question, knowing how important it was that he handle this the right way.

"I drew you because you bring me peace, Jean," he answered her at last. "Because when I think of you," he kissed her cheek once more, unable to stay away, "I'm not afraid, any more."

This seemed more than sufficient explanation for Jean, for she lifted her chin and caught his lips in her own, reaching between them to attack the buttons of his shirt at once. Lucien lifted himself up to give her better access, his hands planted on either side of her head, his tongue swirling through her mouth, his whole body tense and tight as a bowstring as he waited for her to finish her task, to finally feel the warm slide of his bare skin against her own.

And then she was done, and they were struggling together, tugging off his shirt, pulling away his vest, and then her hands were on him, and all conscious thought seemed to cease. She traced patterns over his shoulders, his pecs, her fingertips drawing circles round and round his nipples until he caught her bottom lip between his teeth in retaliation for her teasing. Jean shivered and moaned and reached for his belt, and even as she did he shifted, ducked his head to drag his tongue over the swell of her breast, hungry for more of her. The heat between them grew with each passing second, his cock hard and aching for her, her hips pressing against him, desperate for more friction, his tongue flicking against her nipple as she whimpered in his arms.

At last he could delay no longer, and rolled to his feet to dispense with his trousers and shorts at once, taking a moment to stare down at Jean, at the black marks of his fingers against every intimate part of her, the red marks of his beard along the curve of her breast, the way her eyes seemed to shine for him. He had never, in all his days, seen anything more beautiful than Jean in that moment, and as he fixed the image of her in his mind he knew that when next he sat down to draw, this would be the only possible outlet of his desire, the only possible vision for him to inscribe on the page.

Jean lifted her arms to him and he was on her in an instant, his hands clenched hard around her hips as her own reached between them, intent upon his hardness. It was Lucien's turn to groan as he felt her tender touch, as she grasped him, pumped him a few times, left him moaning and hungry and thrusting against her palm, desperate for some relief.

"Jean," he breathed her name, his tongue snaking out to trace the shell of her ear. In response she whimpered and shifted beneath him, lifting her hips to him in an invitation she could not deny. He was pressing into her in an instant, the moment so beautiful, so overwhelming he nearly stopped breathing. Though his impulse was to take her hard and fast, to slake the thirst he'd carried for her for so long now, to set them both to trembling, he moderated himself for her sake, feeling her tightness enveloping him, knowing that it would be better for both of them if he took his time.

And so he did, sinking into her slowly, feeling her stretching around him, the heat of her almost more than he could stand. Jean wrapped her delicate hands around the corded muscles of his forearms, her thighs rising up to clench him tightly as she pressed up into him, and the sight of her, the sound of her gentle gasps, nearly drove him wild with need. She was, to his mind, the single most beautiful woman he had ever known, more lovely than any painting, and he was drowning beneath the weight of the moment, caught up in the dream of bliss they'd built for themselves.

They moved together in that place, slow and steady and enraptured, and as he sank deeper and deeper within her, as she rocked beneath him, as the chorus of their delirious whimpers and moans grew louder and louder, he found himself falling more in love with her with each passing second. She had become everything to him, his beacon of hope in the darkness, his refuge, his home, and he did not want to part from her, ever again. Still they pushed and ground together, the tempo of their dance increasing; her hands shifted, clawed at his back as he gathered speed, her breasts bouncing with each thrust of his hips, the sight of her sending him nearer and nearer the edge.

"Please, Lucien, _please, please,_ " she gasped, and at the sound of her begging for him he let out a growl and reached between them, his thumb finding her center, adding that last little bit of friction she needed to tumble from the edge. And then she did, and he was lost. She was whimpering, her sex fluttering around him, the warmth and the wet of her drawing him in deeper, and deeper still, her thighs holding him so tightly, and he could not stop himself. He thrust within her, harder than before, and she let loose a desperate sound that had him spilling inside her in a moment.

* * *

For a long time after Jean simply held him, stroking her hands over the ridges of scars across his back while he dropped tender kisses against her shoulder, both of them sweating and gasping and overcome by what they had just shared. He was going soft inside her but still she held him close, unwilling to part from him just yet, though the uncomfortable wetness of their joining pooling beneath her would send her fleeing from the sofa soon enough. That could wait, however, for Lucien had told her that he loved her, and in the furious heat of his body she had found all the reassurance of his regard for her that she could ever have asked for. He loved her, as she loved him, and all was well.

Still, though, it occurred to her as she lay there beneath the comforting weight of him that they had entered the sunroom for another purpose. With one hand flat upon his back she reached out with the other, fingertips scrabbling across the table top until at last she found what she was searching for.

"Jean, love?" Lucien asked, his lips brushing her neck as she spoke.

"I wanted to see your drawing," she answered, smiling when he kissed her again before rolling to the side, rearranging them so his back was flush to the back of the sofa, and her spine was pressed tight to the line of his chest. One strong arm snaked around her waist, holding her close to him while his lips trailed kisses up and down the back of her neck. Shivering at the heat him Jean closed her eyes for a moment, indulging in the peace and the bliss of his arms around her, his scent, his taste lingering, igniting her sense. She would not be deterred, however, and when the moment passed she turned once more to the sketchbook, and gazed at the half-completed drawing.

It really was beautiful, she admitted to herself as she studied it. He had done well capturing her image, had been true to her form while also adding a little something, a sense of something almost ethereal that she could not quite place. Jean rather liked this image of herself, the strong line of her arms, the proud tilt of her chin. What she liked best of all, however, was that Lucien had drawn it, that she knew now just what he saw when he looked at her.

"Beautiful," he whispered, and she smiled, knowing he was not talking about the drawing.

"Yes, you are," she answered cheekily, letting the sketchbook drop to the floor as she turned in his arms, threading their legs together as her arms snaked around his neck, pulling him to her for another tender kiss. He was beautiful, this man of hers, in body and soul, and now that she knew her love for him was returned, she was determined to show him just how he made her feel.


End file.
